The head of the National Penitentiary Institute of Peru, Wilson Hernández, denounced irregularities in security protocol at the beginning of August when the prison allowed the press several interviews with Antauro Humala, leader of the ethnic nationalist Ethnocacerista Movement and brother of current Peruvian President Ollanta Humala.
The prisoner gave several interviews to the press from his maximum security cell in Piedras Gordas. The phone calls violated security protocols that limit the use of cell phones and video cameras inside the prison without official permission, and contact with visitors outside designated times.
Humala, who is serving a 25-year prison sentence, gave the interviews to Radio Capital and the Peruvian television news program Primera Noticia without permission from prison authorities.
After the interviews, Humala was placed in isolation for seven days and several prison supervisors were fired, according to the publication La Industria.
In response to an accusation by Hernández that reporters brought a hidden camera into the prison, president of the Peruvian Press Council Luis Agois told the radio station RPP that the authorities who allowed the media to enter the prison violated security protocol, not the journalists.
